While you were away: Top 10 stories to bring you up to date

A list comprising of all the important news stories you should catch up on.

A file photo of Tibet's exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama addresses those gathered at Buyant Ukhaa sport palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, in November 2016. (Reuters)

China has warned India over Dalai Lama’s upcoming visit to Arunachal Pradesh, P Chidambaram has termed Narendra Modi governemnt as the world’s ‘most anti-intellectual, here’s a quick update on what’s is the news:

1- Dalai Lama’s Arunachal visit will cause serious damage, says China

Bilateral ties will be seriously damaged if India allows the Dalai Lama to visit Arunachal Pradesh in the coming weeks, China warned on Friday while reiterating its contention that the Tibetan spiritual leader is a “separatist”. The warning from China’s foreign ministry came soon after the country’s former chief negotiator on the border issue, Dai Bingguo, said there should be some give and take to settle the dragging boundary dispute. India dismissed China’s warning saying that New Delhi’s position on the matter is well known.

2- Airport alert for rape-accused UP minister in case he tries to flee country

Airports across the country were on Friday alerted about the possibility of rape-accused UP minister Gayatri Prasad Prajapati trying to flee the country even as chief minister Akhilesh Yadav promised all help in the case. While the minister continues to elude police, a relative of the woman has said a UP Police officer who recorded the victim’s statement threatened to kill them.

The RSS removed one of its leaders from Madhya Pradesh Kundan Chandrawat from all organisational posts for offering a reward of Rs 1 crore for beheading Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan. The decision was announced on RSS’s official Twitter handle on Friday evening.

4- Gurmehar Kaur trolled over video of drunk woman dancing in car, which is not her

Delhi University student Gurmehar Kaur, who found herself in the middle of an acrimonious debate over nationalism, was trolled again on Friday after a video of a young woman singing and dancing in a car circulated on social media. Several Twitter users were quick to assume the girl was the 20-year-old Lady Shri Ram College student, who launched a campaign against the ABVP after violence in the city’s Ramjas College. The woman in the clip is not Kaur but as the video went viral, trolls followed.

A day after the body of a jawan was found dead near his camp in Nashik, an army spokesperson said a “sting operation” conducted by mediapersons may have spurred him to commit suicide. The body of Roy Mathew, a soldier hailing from Kerala, was found a few days after he accused senior officers of harassment in an interview with a Marathi channel. The programme aired on Monday. An army spokesperson said there was no question of probing the allegations made in the video because no names were revealed.

Terming the Narendra Modi government as the world’s “most anti-intellectual” for questioning experts on GDP figures, former finance minister P Chidambaram said on Friday that the economy will take 12-18 months to recover from the “devastating” impact of demonetisation. “It (the government) even thinks that Amartya Sen, professor at Harvard is undeserving of any respect. It thinks that Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard are all useless,” he said.

The Vietnam government has announced it will suspend the import of five agricultural products from India after several consignments were found to be contaminated with peanut beetle. Within 60 days of the order being issued, Vietnam’s agriculture ministry will stop issuing import permits for peanuts, cassia seed, cocoa beans, haricot beans and tamarind from India. A Vietnamese state-run news agency said that the country’s authorities notified their Indian counterparts of the contamination but no corrective measures were taken.

The Uttar Pradesh elections are a litmus test for Moditva, a phenomenon that has dominated the political discourse in India since the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. It is shaping into a political ideology of sorts, a creed with millions of followers. Travel around Uttar Pradesh and you come across many who swear by it. What is striking is the near-blind faith in Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Most of those who swear by him cannot name a leader who Modi can nominate as CM and who would turn things around.

CISF officers guarding the Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi are back in their khakis, less than a month after they suited up in an apparent image makeover exercise. The reason? Passenger feedback that uniformed personnel are easier to identify and give a better sense of security.